claim

active

claim:evolution-makes-problem-solving-agents-not-solutions-commitment-to-mutation-and-uncontrollable-environments-as-ratchet-for-intelligence

Evolution makes problem-solving agents, not solutions; commitment to mutation and uncontrollable environments as ratchet for intelligence

Source paper

extracted_from

Self-Improvising Memory: A Perspective on Memories as Agential, Dynamically Reinterpreting Cognitive Glue

(2024) · Levin, Michael

Neighborhood — ranked by edge-count

Communities (3)

community

Causal emergence in biological systems
members_of
Examines how macro-scale causal power exceeds micro-scale in living and learning systems.
Agential evolution & biological individuality
members_of
Frames evolution as producing goal-directed, problem-solving agents across nested scales of individuality.
Evolutionary individuality and hierarchical agency
members_of
Multi-level selection theory examining how non-aggregative fitness interactions enable higher-order units as genuine evolutionary agents, emphasizing problem-solving over predetermined mechanisms.

Concepts (2)

concept

Mnemonic Improvisation
supports
Central concept: the dynamic ability to rewrite and remap information (memories) onto new media and contexts across multiple scales (behavioral, genetic, physiological).
intelligence ratchet based on remapping
associated_with
Positive feedback loop where remapping hides information, driving evolution of higher competency.

Related by similarity (8)

cosine ≥ 0.65 · no typed edge

Entities in the same semantic neighborhood but without a typed relation to this one — candidates for new edges or unrecognized duplicates.

Biology's robustness, open-endedness, evolvability, and unique complexity likely depend on the fact that evolution works with an agential material.claim0.846
Central claim linking life's properties to the inherent competencies of its material substrate.
The evolutionary process contains an intelligence ratchet: as competency increases, selection struggles to see the structural genome, further driving selection for competency mechanisms.claim0.843
Explains why planaria with messy genomes have robust morphologies.
Evolution learns to generalize beyond default morphologies, producing problem-solving machines.claim0.838
Argues that evolutionary learning goes beyond specific adaptations.
Evolution often produces general-purpose problem-solving machines whose capacities cannot be inferred from the default invariant course of development.claim0.837
A claim about the outcome of the MCA-enhanced process.
Open-ended evolution of intelligence is possible because agents are collectives without fixed essencehypothesis0.826
Follows from observation that intelligent systems lack context-transcendent core; their maxima are not contingent on permanent character.
Evolution actually searches not only genotype space but a more tractable space of behavior-shaping signals that exploit cellular intelligence.claim0.822
Central thesis of the paper.
Evolution does not simply make hardwired machines that execute a predetermined set of steps; instead, it produces problem-solving hardware.claim0.820
Key insight about the nature of evolved systems.
Evolution is more intelligent than we realised, equivalent to connectionist learningclaim0.816
Interpretive stance that the formal equivalence implies cognitive capabilities in evolution

Cross-corpus bridges (12)

same_concept_as · Nomic cosine

External markdown files that talk about the same concept as this entity.

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Evolutionary Intelligence Ratchetframeworks/evolutionary-intelligence-ratchet.md0.847
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How can evolution explore design space and improve evolvability without explicit fitness testing by an external agent?questions/how-can-evolution-explore-design-space-and-improve.md0.825
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Can evolution be more intelligent than we realized through formal equivalence with learning?questions/can-evolution-be-more-intelligent-than-we-realized.md0.823
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What is the relationship between genetic information and the emergent problem-solving behavior of living systems?questions/what-is-the-relationship-between-genetic-information-and.md0.822
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How can evolution be so rapid and effective at using mutation to address opportunities of form and function despite rugged fitness landscapes?questions/how-can-evolution-be-so-rapid-and-effective.md0.812
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What determines the evolutionary transition between hardwired phenotypes and competency-based development?questions/what-determines-the-evolutionary-transition-between-hardwired-phenotypes.md0.812
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Can stress-induced mutations and responses drive evolutionary innovation and origin of novel traits?questions/can-stressinduced-mutations-and-responses-drive-evolutionary-innovation.md0.807
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How can we develop artificial neural networks whose output is not specific solutions but seeds determining flexible problem-solving machines?questions/how-can-we-develop-artificial-neural-networks-whose.md0.806
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How can organisms with extremely variable or messy genomes (like planaria) exhibit superior morphological control compared to organisms with stable genomes?questions/how-can-organisms-with-extremely-variable-or-messy.md0.805
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How can particles evolve to control and take advantage of collective benefits despite experiencing reversed selection pressure across contexts?questions/how-can-particles-evolve-to-control-and-take.md0.802
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What role do competing interpretations play in enabling biological innovation and evolutionary flexibility?questions/what-role-do-competing-interpretations-play-in-enabling.md0.802
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What are the implications of recognizing that evolution exploits mathematical patterns not determined by physics?questions/what-are-the-implications-of-recognizing-that-evolution.md0.799